Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) for Fatigue in Patients With Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA)

Overview

Fatigue is a symptom present in 76 to 92% of people with multiple sclerosis (MS). Fatigue is usually described as an overwhelming sense of tiredness, lack of energy, and feeling of exhaustion which is different from sleepiness. Fatigue is also a symptom commonly seen in people with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). The overall objective is to develop a non-pharmacological treatment for fatigue in MS. The objective of this study is to evaluate if treatment of OSA with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) improves fatigue in MS subjects with OSA and fatigue. This will be a small pilot randomized, double-blind, sham-controlled clinical trial; the control group will be treated with a sham-CPAP machine and intervention group will be treated with an auto-titration CPAP machine. The primary outcome measure will be improvement (decrease) in the Modified Fatigue Impact Scale from baseline. The duration of intervention will be 12 weeks to achieve a clinical response in the treatment group. After this intervention participants in both groups will be offered a referral to the sleep clinic of their preference for formal treatment as per standard of care.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a demyelinating inflammatory disease that is one of the most common neurological causes of disability in young adults. Besides physical disability, fatigue is a very common symptom present in 76 to 92% of people with MS. The 1998 Multiple Sclerosis Council for clinical practice guidelines published a consensus definition: subjective lack of physical and/or mental energy that is perceived by the individual or caregiver to interfere with the usual and desired activity. Although fatigue may be difficult to differentiate from sleepiness, it is a clinically different symptom. Sleepiness is the tendency to fall asleep or doze off. Some reports that the prevalence of moderate to severe sleep problems in MS is significantly higher than in the general population 51.5% vs 33.1%. It has also been reported that poor sleep can correlate with depression in subject with MS. Few studies have examined the effect of stimulants, amantadine or modafinil for treatment of fatigue and have shown contradictory data as effective treatments in MS patients. Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) has also been seen described in MS. Few case reports studies have reported that MS patients with OSA treated with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) had improvement in fatigue but not quality of life. Although the prevalence of OSA in the MS population is unknown, it may as much as twice as common as in the general population, which is 3 to 7%. Aside from the increased risk of daytime sleepiness, mood disorders, cardiovascular risk factors and accidents, OSA has also been implicated in increasing inflammatory markers like tumor necrosis factor (TNF-α). Elevation in TNF-α has also been seen in MS patients complaining of fatigue, which is thought to play a role in pathophysiology of fatigue in MS. The rational of this study is to determine if treatment of OSA with CPAP in MS patients improves fatigue. If effective, CPAP may not only decrease the risk of long term complications but may also improve the quality of life and daily living of these patients.